What You Can Learn from Reading Your Book Reviews by Nancy Christie

What You Can Learn from Reading Your Book Reviews

by Nancy Christie

Some authors have a policy of never reading reviews about
their books. Maybe they fear that bad reviews might depress them to the point
of not being able to write again or good reviews might inflate their ego to a
level where they believe they are too
good to need improvement.

But as Thomas Taylor wrote in his post, "Should
authors read reviews of their own books?", “why wouldn’t authors want
to know what people are saying about their books? Surely there’s a lot to be
learnt from how readers are reacting to our work.”

Granted, there’s a risk that we might not like what readers
are saying about our “baby”—What do you
mean the plot was overly convoluted? How can you say the characters weren’t
drawn from real life?—but at the same time, there is the possibility that you might find others have understood and
appreciated the point you were trying to make or enjoyed the humorous aspects
that you slipped in the narrative.

So should you read your reviews or leave that to your
publisher or agent?

While it might be easier, and potentially less traumatic, to
let someone else digest the comments for you, I think you ought to “chew” them
yourself. Here are two ways I suggest you evaluate the reviews your book
receives, based on my experience both as an author (The Gifts of Change and Traveling Left of Center
and Other Stories) and as someone who reads
reviews when choosing what books to buy.

You can learn what worked.

As writers, we have techniques we tend to employ (for
example, I like to open my fiction with dialogue) as well as a voice that is,
or should be, distinctively ours. And nothing is more rewarding than reading a
review that shows the reader enjoyed or appreciated those aspects.

Admittedly, I was a little concerned about how the book
would be received, since the tales involve people who are finding it difficult,
if not impossible, to handle what life has thrown at them or the challenges of
the path they have chosen to traverse. (As Ioana Juliawrote in her review:
“You soon learn there is no turn for the best; it’s either downhill from where
the story begins or a perpetual state of painful stagnation.”)

But on the whole, the reviewers recognized “and they lived
happily ever after” isn’t the message
of the collection and appreciated that I was able to take “that dark
desperation of the human condition and [gave] it vibrant life and energy,” as one
Goodreads
reviewer put it.

As you read your reviews, look for comments that, in one
fashion or another, praise specific aspects of your writing. Do you create
well-drawn characters? Are your plots tightly woven? Are your descriptive
passages done with such detail that readers say, “I could almost taste the
food/smell the fragrance, and feel the ocean breeze”? Those are clearly areas
where you are already doing well as a writer.

You can learn what needs to be improved

And now we move onto what we don’t like reading: the criticism, the critiques, the “this really
should have been done better.” (In the interest of full disclosure, one
reviewer, while loving the work as a whole, wasn’t a big fan of two of the
pieces and another thought the longest story in the piece, “Annabelle,” would
have benefited from shortening!)

What kind of negative comments has your book received?

Some might be about the creative aspect—the reviewer didn’t
care for the theme, felt the characters lacked substance, or the plot was
either too tortuous to follow or so clear that the ending was apparent from the
beginning.

Others might be more technical in nature. Are you
consistently reading that your work has factual errors, spelling or grammar
mistakes, story line blunders—for example, changes in a character’s age or
location that don’t make sense?

In either case, these are problems that can be fixed. If the
issues are on the creative or “writing” side, work at improving your ability.
(As Traveling Left of
Center and Other Stories was being prepared for publication—and undergoing
numerous rewrites!—my editor regularly recommended that I be more precise and
specific in my descriptions. As a result, for one story I spent several hours
researching types of roses to find those that fit the color and fragrance of
the one my character received from a suitor.)

If the mistakes are technical, please, please, please use an editor before sending your
baby off to be printed. I can’t tell you how distracting it is as a reader to
find errors that should have been caught early in the process. It disrupts the
flow and makes me start looking for other mistakes instead of concentrating on
the work. (Self-published authors: hiring an editor is a cost that should be in your author budget. It’s
very difficult to edit your own work. I speak from years of experience as a
writer—and someone who transposes letters more than she cares to admit!)

One more bonus to be gained from reviews

You can learn something new about your own work. We think,
because we created it, that we know all there is to know about what we wrote
and why we wrote it. But it wasn’t until Mike Wever, reviewer and former editor
of Wanderings, pointed out that in “Annabelle,”
my central character chose “a psychologist who demonstrates the same detached
attention she craved from her father [exemplifying] how hard that pattern can be
to break” that I realized I had created that type of therapist.

And more than one reviewer noted that my stories explored
the mother-daughter dynamic—something I wasn’t consciously aware of when I
chose the individual pieces but in retrospect, is quite accurate.

In summary, reviews can provide valuable pieces of
information about your work that can not only encourage you but also help you
become a better writer. And isn’t that what we strive for?

Some fascinating points here, Nancy! Thank you for stopping by with these words of wisdom. :)

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